


Missing You

by JazzKat1213



Series: We’ve Made It This Far [3]
Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Adora Adjusting to Brightmoon, Angst, Canon Compliant, During Canon, F/F, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Kissing, Origin of a Hero References, POV Adora (She-Ra), Pining, Post-Canon, Sad with a Happy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-12
Updated: 2021-02-12
Packaged: 2021-03-15 12:28:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29314083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JazzKat1213/pseuds/JazzKat1213
Summary: I’m allowed to miss what I had. I’m allowed to miss you. I’m not allowed to miss what could’ve been.5 times Adora forgot Catra wasn't there anymore and the peace that comes with the realisation that she'll never have to feel that way again.
Relationships: Adora/Catra (She-Ra)
Series: We’ve Made It This Far [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1759741
Comments: 9
Kudos: 49





	Missing You

**Author's Note:**

> Context: Adora realises she's in love somewhere between seasons 1 and 2
> 
> TW: implied starvation, implied past child abuse, implied anxiety attacks

**During**

_I’m allowed to miss what I had. I’m allowed to miss you. I’m not allowed to miss what could’ve been._

It’s only been a few weeks since she defected the first time it happens. 

She’s walking through Brightmoon hallways with Bow after training. The sword is finally starting to feel comfortable in her hand, and even Bow could tell that. But that's not what they're talking about, no, he's telling a story from his and Glimmer's childhood that actually has her laughing. He’s recounting the time they got caught stealing food from the kitchens late at night. Which is funny mostly because they were allowed to, and they still ran like criminals.

There’s a lot of things she doesn’t relate to here, so much that is alien and sometimes plain confusing. But this she knows, she’s done it too. Or at least some darkened mirror of it; her and Catra running away with their spoils after sneaking into a box full of ration bars before they reached the barren Fright Zone kitchens. Her and Catra giggling with armfuls of food despite the very real consequences waiting for them later. 

It’s still a good memory though, Catra’s scratchy laughter echoing through her rough breathing. Their matching manic grins and Catra's breathy purr when they settled in a dark corner to eat only a few of them, determined to keep some for later. And they did, storing them in a vent Catra knew well, not too far from the barracks. It was nice to not have to worry about either of them going hungry for a while.

Catra’s probably remembering it too. Sure they only did it three times (only did it successfully twice) but it’s still _good_ behind the darkness. She looks over at her, hoping she’s smiling too.

But she’s not. Because Catra’s not here. Not anymore. Catra didn’t come with her.  
And she’s alone.

She doesn’t have her - she never had her. It smells like the ash in her memories, her eyes burn.  
And she’s staring at the wall without seeing it. 

“Hey, you okay?”  
She feels a hollow inside herself. One she’s been ignoring so valiantly. One that whispers Thaymore in her ears and makes her taste smoke on her tongue. It threatens to be flooded but she won’t allow it, blinks back the building tears slowly so they won’t spill.

This was her decision. She doesn’t regret it. She has _regrets_ , but none about joining the Rebellion. She made the _right_ choice. Catra just doesn’t see that.  
“Yeah I’m - I’m fine Bow. Just thought I saw something.”

* * *

Breakfast in bed is a new thing for Adora. And it still feels that way even though the amount of times she's done it is in double digits now. It’s just so…not the Horde. It’s nice, and it’s calm, and it’s fun without even the _possibility_ of a reprimand. Like most things here, she's learning.

She’s gone to get it herself today, since Bow was still trying to coax Glimmer out from under her bedding. She is _bad_ in the mornings, a lethargy unlike any she’s ever seen. (Mostly because you couldn’t be like that in the Horde - you wouldn’t survive.)

But she doesn't mind going alone. Her time here has been short enough that the castle is still a source of amazement for her. And she really does like Brightmoon’s gigantic communal dining room. Not that it’s the _only_ dining room, Brightmoon has multiple of the same _recreational_ room type. It’s weird.  
Sure, the Horde had several food dispensaries and the halls full of metal tables to go along with them. But that was to stop the unauthorised mixing of squadrons. Brightmoon encourages everyone to talk to one another. And it can be...intimidating, especially with the whole She-Ra thing. (She’s just glad a lot of people can’t recognise her normal form. Yet.) Which she supposes adds to her liking of the meals where it’s just the three of them. 

She thanks the cook - one from Dryl actually if she remembers correctly - as she collects the piled up food for the three of them. That’s another thing, she can come back for more _whenever she wants_ (which is most days, as it turns out.) Bow and Glimmer at least find amusement in her appetite.

There’s a guard out of uniform she recognises (but cannot for the life of her remember what their name is) across the room. They’re with their friends, two of them, around one of the smaller tables. The one she half-knows and another are laughing at the third. More specifically at his inability to keep awake, frown lines etched deep in his forehead. The grumpy one is swatting his arm around, trying to reach for a cup his friend is keeping out of his reach. 

Adora gets why they’re laughing. The space between fully awake and sleepy forms a special kind of grumpy. One she herself has made use of many times.

“And I thought you were bad in the mornings.”  
She waits for a scoff or even a light punch to her shoulder. And turns her head to her other side when it’s utterly silent, utterly still.

And it comes crashing down on her.  
Her hands shake so hard she almost drops the food she’s holding. 

The food she’s taking to her new friends. The ones who get to have breakfast in bed, who get to eat whenever they want. The ones who’ve never gone more than a day without a meal. Who have never known punishment for making sure the other makes it through the night. 

There’s empty space beside her. She doesn’t get to see Catra in the mornings anymore. She doesn’t get to _see_ her, period. Not from anywhere other than a battlefield. She doesn’t get to know if she’s eaten today, or even in the last week. She doesn’t even know if she’s _safe_. She must be, Catra’s a Force Captain now. There are reasons why she - why _they_ \- tried so hard to get to that point. Reasons other than Shadow Weaver forcing the idea on her from the moment she could think. There has to have been. 

She hasn’t even thought of Catra the past few days and it feels...it feels like she’s forgotten her. She _hasn’t_ ; she _can’t_. Catra is a bloody tattoo on her soul, painfully permanent. She can't forget her entire life from before the sword, no matter how much easier it would be.

The Horde’s been quiet, that’s all. And she should be glad - people aren’t getting hurt. But not thinking about the Horde apparently means not thinking about _her_ and - and it _hurts_. It hurts because instead of that constant emptiness she was carrying at the beginning, the one she grew used to, it comes crashing down all at once when she’s not prepared for it.

Her flimsy grip on the tray turns superhuman, overcompensating in a way.  
‘ _I’m fine. I’m not going to drop this just because I feel like a hole’s opened up in my chest._ ’

She scurries out the hall, feeling like everyone is looking at her. All she hears is ‘She-Ra’ but it’s enough to make her heart beat ricochet in her ears.  
But she makes it to Glimmer’s room without dropping anything. It’s embarrassingly difficult to just breathe through the feeling of _wound_ in her chest. She places the food down, and clasps her hands behind her back when she finds them shaking slightly. She can blame it on a soldier's upbringing. 

Bow and Glimmer don’t notice. Just asking her to sit and eat with them, all smiles now they have food. She declines, eerily polite. Mumbles something about not being hungry that they take without too much protest. Just flattened smiles they cover up quickly.

And she walks. She doesn’t even know where until she’s on some balcony overlooking the gardens. The breeze doesn’t clear her head at all, doesn’t fix this ugly missing inside her and she wants to _break something_. She settles for raking a rough hand through her hair, pulling it all down before forcing it back up again. 

Catra would’ve known that something was wrong. She never skips out on food otherwise. But it’s only been a couple months. And they don’t know her like that - they might never. She doesn’t even know if she wants them to.

Because if anyone in the Rebellion learns her the way Catra spent her whole life doing not even on purpose then...then they’ll know everything. All the ways she can fail them. And that’s not what she’s here for.  
Ultimately She-Ra is the reason she’s here, the reason why anybody here cares at all. And she can’t afford to be dragged down by _missing_ \- _longing_ \- of all things. Especially not for the enemy.

* * *

Adora doesn’t go for runs all that often, usually content to beat punching bags till dusk. But today she’s too restless for even that. Glimmer says that a change in scenery would help, so here she is, running along the edge of the woods. 

And it does help, the shifting blues in her sights is calming. She pushes her legs as fast as they’ll go until she’s panting so hard she can’t breathe. The castle is majestic up close but from far away it’s near ethereal, a cream-purple-pink haze with the glow of the Moonstone. It’s wildy idyllic, she finds, as she sits by the water’s edge, the cool of it on her now-bare feet is welcome. 

She sits for a while, staring at the sky as she catches her breath, checking every minute that nothing is going to come out of the woods. She doesn’t have her sword with her.  
But nothing happens and she blankets all thought with the sound of flowing water.

She’s pulling her shoes back on when she sees a stone in the water. It looks like glass - it might be glass - but it’s a soft blue no matter what it is. She turns it over in her fingers. It’s not unlike the blue stone she found in a pile of junk in the Fright Zone, the one she tried to give to Catra only for her to deny it. 

_“Nah - you can keep it. It matches your eyes.”_  
She remembers the swirl in her stomach when Catra had said it. She always feels like that when Catra’s...thoughtful. Catra’s always observant but when she observes things about _her_ it’s just different. 

It’s also rare that Catra is sweet but she is; she _can be_. And she only ever _is_ for her. She’d said it as well:  
_“You are so sweet.”_  
_“Ew! You did_ not _just say that about me. Take it back!”_

She’s grinning so damn wide just remembering. She wonders if Catra would say the same thing now. She wants her to, wants to try and insist Catra take it anyway. She doesn’t really know why. It just feels...important, somehow.

It takes all of ten seconds for her musings to crumble to reality; Catra’s not here. The rock falls from her hand, landing silently on the embankment. She forces herself to leave the feeling behind as she runs back to the castle.

* * *

“I think we’ve got something here,” Glimmer says, pointing to the hologram map, a newly formed plan in place. 

Adora snorts quietly. It’s so obviously flawed, the gap in the defense laughable.  
_‘Gods Catra’s gonna tear this apart.’_  
She waits for the telltale, _“You’re kidding me, right?”_ to come from beside her.

And it doesn’t come. It never does anymore. Because Catra’s not fucking here. How can she _keep forgetting this._  
She is not crying, she hasn’t sunk that low; the Horde at least made sure of that. But she wants to.

Her breaths come out strained and forced as she stares at the hologram. She needs to say something since no one else is. She slumps in her chair, feeling like something’s been taken out of her.  
“There’s a hundred ways the Horde could sneak through the defenses on the east side.”

“...Thank you, Adora,” Angella says almost hesitantly from the head of the table.  
She can’t even bring herself to nod a recognition. She feels heavy and...observed. There’s too many eyes on her and she’s not sure how many of them she’s imagining. (None of them are the eyes she _wants_ them to be, so it doesn’t matter.) 

She knows the last time she felt this bad; it’s why right now feels near unbearable. She knows _exactly_ what she realised. Her own stupid, irresponsible, _permanent_ feelings that she should’ve kept locked away. She’s always been good at building barriers; she just can’t figure out why it all broke _then_. 

And the truth, though thoroughly buried as far down as it’ll go, manages to crawl its way to the edges of her mind now. It’s not the first time, but all the times pervious, she managed to choke out the feeling before it cemented. This is real and _here_ , tearing through her.  
She can push it away again. She _will_.

No one knows she has these feelings, crushed and fractured the way she’s made them to be, in her chest. She just needs to put them _back_ there.

“May I be excused?”  
Angella’s veiled concern is understandable considering she’s never done anything even close to this before. “Is everything alright?”  
“Yes, of course. I’ll be back, I just need some air.”

She’s not running away. She’s not. She’ll go back, she just needs to breathe without people _looking_ at her, expecting things from her. All she does is go to the nearest doorway, tucking herself into the alcove. It feels like hiding (probably because it is) but she reasons that it’s okay because it’ll be better if she does this. Getting a fucking _grip_ will help the Rebellion. 

_‘It’s not about me, it’s about them. It’s not about me, it’s about them.’_

When she realises her legs are shaking, she slides down the wall. The cold, steady floor helps. And she stares. At the wall, the ceiling, the floor, the door, hoping it doesn’t open unexpectedly. All the while willing herself into numbness.  
And it works. Because she makes it so. Because she is more powerful than these feelings. 

She stands, makes sure there’s no tremors to be found, and starts walking the short distance back to the war room. There’s no one she passes and no one waiting for her. She lets out a relieved breath. That means no questions until afterwards, and by then she hopes they’ll have forgotten. (They won’t have, but she’ll at least have an excuse ready if they do ask that’s as far from the truth as she can get it.)

There’s eyes on her again in an instant but she’s prepared for them this time. She makes it back to her seat without even an expression giving away what just happened. Juliet didn’t even falter in her words as she entered. 

What doesn’t help is the blatantly worried looks Bow and Glimmer burn into her head from either side.  
“Are you alright?” Bow whispers, and it makes her feel sick. Or it would if she were letting herself feel much of anything right now.  
“Yeah.” She manages to soften her soldier's blank expression just for him. “Like I said, just needed some air.”

* * *

Adora’s always had nightmares, always been plagued by the things she’d seen in the day-to-day, even after she’d pushed them as far down as possible. Because it was the Horde and horror was normal, she couldn’t let herself be scared or disgusted or show any weakness or doubt. 

That’s what dreams were for. 

Sleeping brought sweet relief from the new but dragged forth the old, she could never decide what was worse. She still can’t. Because reality was, and is, set in stone in many ways. There are rules and regulations and timetables preventing certain possibilities. But the sleeping world? Those rules don’t apply and every _‘what if…’_ her head can come up with has a chance of appearing in the blackness.

Tonight she dreams of the black garnet, shining red like dried blood. And she’s seen enough blood in her life to know exactly what it looks like - what it feels like as it crumbles off her skin. 

She sees Catra, young and scared, fur fluffed up in a defense that’s useless. Sees the terror in her eyes when she fears for her life, sees the remorseless gaze of the only adult they’ve ever known looking down at her. She doesn’t know why Shadow Weaver chose her as the favourite, but she knows it could’ve just as easily been her at the end of red lightning instead.  
She’s not grateful it wasn’t.

She’s dreamt about this so many times. They always start the same, children as happy as they can be in the Horde, find a room they shouldn't go into. They enter anyway and what happens next is all her fault. But every ending is different. 

Sometimes they just leave, her mind playing mercy with her. Others Catra disappears from the dream-memory, even that is terrifying in its own way. The rest, there’s pain and ghostly whimpers. Sometimes Catra dies, or at the very least stays unmoving on the floor and Adora’s dream body can do nothing but watch. Tonight is one of those nights.

Red energy zaps across Catra’s skin before she’s thrown across the room and her body crumbles to the ground. At least Catra doesn’t scream. But Adora does. Black tendrils curl and consume Catra’s body and white eyes turn on her. 

She’s thrown from sleep before Shadow Weaver reaches her but she still feels the cold void of her magic as she wakes. She grips onto herself as if it’ll keep the cold out. She doesn’t open her eyes, she can’t stand to see shadows. After forcing her grip to loosen, she reaches blindly for Catra at the end of her bed.  
She needs to feel her, to make sure she’s still alive. That she didn’t fail all those years ago; that she hasn’t been alone for all this time, making up the friend she lost. 

There’s nothing but empty space under her fingers and her heartbeat panics in her chest. She sits up with her eyes wide open, every muscle tense. Her eyes adjust quickly in the darkness. And in spite of everything, in spite of the violent dreams echoing bad memories, she wishes she hadn’t woken up. 

Catra’s not here. She’s not snoring lightly in the bunk above, she’s not anywhere because she’s _gone_. Adora left - left Catra with that _monster_ \- and now she’s in Brightmoon, alone in her room, looking at the space where Catra should be. Like so many times before.

She lets her hands lie uselessly in her lap, empty like they should be holding something. Holding _Catra_. There’s nothing here that will feel like her, nothing comes close to the bristling softness of her fur. Not her heat, not her eyes. Nothing here can make her feel the way finally getting Catra to laugh after a bad day did. 

“Why couldn’t you have just come with me?” She whispers into the darkness, speaking, begging to no one. Her voice breaks anyway. 

_‘What did I do wrong that pushed you away?’_ Is the question she wants to scream every time she sees her. Sees the pain and anger in her eyes. 

The pleading gets swallowed by the night. She'll never allow it to land on Rebel ears. She can’t let her friends know, it’ll only cause them pain. _Preventable_ pain. She lets her tears pool in her hands as they fall.

* * *

**After**

It’s been, what, a week (eight days exactly, she’s been counting) since Prime and she can’t get used to it. She keeps turning to talk to Catra and it’s not because she’s forgotten that she’s here, it’s because she _is_. All the scoffs and eyerolls, though more infrequent than they used to be, happen more often than not when she’s expecting them. Catra’s eyes _are_ in the dark now - she’s not fabricating it out of longing.

There’s so many little things she never realised the rift caused. Uncountable things.  
Rooftops don’t hurt anymore, not now she has the person she always shares them with beside her again. And Melog of course. 

Catra’s been helping her up to the places in Brightmoon she doesn’t think anyone else knows about. Mostly because no one save for Glimmer (and maybe Spinnerella or Swift Wind) could even get to.  
They haven’t climbed the mountain yet, but they will one day. A future plan still feels strange to have when she was so convinced she was going to die for the war. But it’s nice. It’s better than nice; to be alive, to wake up everyday to her friends and _girlfriend_ alive too, safe around her. The girlfriend she has now, who’s loved her just as long, it turns out.

So she figures she can’t be blamed for the way she gets caught up in Catra’s presence, reason or not. Catra looks different in Brightmoon. She uses that excuse a lot. The light is different; white and blue instead of green and red. Catra just looks...brighter, kinder. She looks older too, not the teenager in her memories, the one that wasn’t hers.

“What?”  
Just because she is allowed to look now doesn’t mean she exactly feels like she can. Nearly twenty-one years of ingrained habit made out of fear apparently take longer than they’ve had to dispel.  
“Nothing.”  
“You’ve got that look on your face.”  
“Which one?” she asks like she doesn’t know.  
Because it gets Catra to flush just slightly under her freckles every time. Makes the slope of her ears soft. “You know which one...”

She leans her head on Catra’s shoulder, melts into the arm around her shoulders as she stares at the first moonset of the day.  
“I just...I missed you.”  
“I’ve been with you all day, dummy.”  
“Bigger than that. You’re here. You haven’t been _here_ , with me, in a long time.”

Catra’s tail makes a dull thud against the roof. A series of kisses gets lost in her hair as Catra pulls her closer (Catra really likes doing that and she is no way inclined to stop her.) Melog curls into the side of her that's open to the air, humming with static. They meow quietly as she starts stroking their head.

“Anything you need?” Catra asks after a while of just holding her.  
It’s nice to not worry about the time and what she should be doing, she’s learning. She winds her hand with the one dangling off her shoulder, ignoring how Melog grumbles about it, and pulling back so she can look at Catra properly.  
“Just...be you?”

Catra’s face scrunches up the way it does sometimes, Adora still hasn’t figured out what exactly causes it, but she will.  
“How would you suggest I do that?”  
“Make snarky comments about people you don’t know or something.”

Catra laughs. Because she does that now, freely and without even trying to smother it. At least around her. Adora squeezes their joined hands together.  
“But only when they’re close enough that you think they’ll hear but you can deny it. _Except_ they don’t hear it at all because literally none of them had your senses.” Catra’s laughing fades and her eyes flick between nothing in particular. “Are you just now realising why so few of them actually tried to fight you?”

Catra’s tail snaps and her fur fluffs up, “What? No. Of course I - yes I knew.”  
“Uh huh. Sure you did.”  
“Shut up,” Catra snaps weakly before she turns her head back to the sky.  
She kisses Catra’s cheek to placate her. (And because she wants to and she _can_.) There’s a louder crackling purr from Melog against her side.

“I never did figure out why you’d do all those things that you knew would get you in trouble.”  
Catra thinks about it for a moment, ear flicking when a stronger breeze hits it. Adora kisses the base of it just to get Catra purring too.  
“Because I could, to get attention, spite, an outlet if you want to be all ‘Perfuma’ about it. Sometimes it was just to see the way you’d try not to smile. You tried _so hard_ to pretend to be above all of that.”

She loves the way Catra’s grinning right now. “Yeah, well I wasn’t, considering I’d usually join you.”  
“Because you _love_ me.”  
Melog stands up to lick once at her hand. She’s learnt very recently that it usually means Catra wants to kiss her. Which she’d realise if Catra saying _that_ like _that_ hadn’t shut something down in her head. But she doesn’t have to realise because Catra kisses her anyway. 

She sighs into it, bringing her other arm around Catra’s waist and untangling their hands so she can hold Catra’s cheek. “That’s my line,” she mutters into soft skin.  
Catra pulls back and Adora will absolutely deny pouting about it. “Oh, can’t handle it the other way, Princess?”

She rolls her eyes because apparently she _cannot_ handle Catra saying it back but she’s not going to _admit_ that. “You’re the worst. And I wasn’t done kissing you.”  
As much as Catra teases her, she still meets her halfway with a hand on the back of her neck. 

“Will you ever be done?”  
“Nope.”  
And that would be the end of it - she is getting more and more distracted by the way Catra tastes - but there’s something she hasn’t said. (Because Catra’s capable of rendering her useless with tone alone.) 

“And I do - love you, I mean.”  
Catra’s almost smiling too wide to properly kiss her when she pulls her back in and whispers, “Yeah, think you know what I'm gonna say to that.”  
"Say it anyway." Even though she doesn't want Catra to stop kissing her for a second, hearing it is worth it.  
"I love you Adora."

**Author's Note:**

> The whole stone thing has word for word quotes from Origin of a Hero because they are _gay_.
> 
> The ending is an apology for YSSMIAC having no kissing yet <3


End file.
